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Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

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Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#71

Post by subscribed »

NotGMan wrote: post #35

>> Witnessing such scorched-earth containment makes the modern definition of nuclear power as the ‘cleanest energy’ completely incomprehensible to me. It's called bad governing. To connect nuclear "not clean" with such bad governing is bit much.

Precisely.

Especially when comparing the number of deaths(1) from then-China's favourite energy source or simply Uranium's efficiency(2) and the fact we know now how to recycle most of the waste(3)

Sure, I prefer the solar too, but I agree the governance is the bigger problem in the example from the story.

(1) https://www.researchgate.net/figure/rates-for-each-energy-so... and https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2023/10/new-nuclear-power-is-p...

(2) https://xkcd.com/1162/

(3) https://whatisnuclear.com/recycling.html and https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036054421...

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#72

Post by Vincent_Yan404 »

moffers wrote: post #65
Vincent_Yan404 wrote: post #2

Hi HN, OP here. I grew up in "Factory 404," a secret nuclear industrial city in the Gobi Desert that officially didn't exist on public maps. This is a memoir about my childhood there. It was a surreal place: we had elite scientists living next to laborers, a zoo in the middle of the desert, and distinct "communist" welfare, all hidden behind a classified code. This is Part 1 of the story. I'm happy to answer any ques…

Was there anything you can recall that 404 maybe had but the rest of China might not have because of its special status? Access to newer consumer technologies, or something like that? Just was curious if there was something “better” about living in a government secret beyond long train rides and melting neighbors.

Exactly. To give you some concrete examples that I’ll dive deeper into in Part 2:

Soviet Architecture: Many of our residential and administrative buildings were designed and built by Soviet experts, giving the city a distinct 'Stalinist empire' aesthetic that felt very grand compared to the surrounding desert.

Elite Salaries: The wage levels in our factory were on par with those in Beijing, which was extraordinary given our remote location.

The 'Post-Scarcity' Bubble: For many families, daily expenses were minimal because the 'unit' (Danwei) provided almost everything. We regularly received rations of high-quality rice, flour, and oil as part of our work benefits, so we rarely had to spend money on basic survival.

In a country that was still struggling with scarcity, living in 404 felt like living in a futuristic, well-provisioned fortress. Stay tuned for Part 2, where I'll talk more about this 'gilded' lifestyle.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#73

Post by onionisafruit »

fcpguru wrote: post #68

Amazing, related story. I had a friend that always talked about growning up in 418 Pennsylvania. It began as a company town for a ceramics manufacturer in the 1920s. The factory specialized in heat resistant vessels. You know like kettles, pitchers, industrial teapots. Each stamped each with a model number tied to production lines. Line 418 was the most profitable. When the post office opened, the clerk assumed “418”…

I grew up in 200 Pennsylvania. It was ok.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#74

Post by Vincent_Yan404 »

fcpguru wrote: post #68

Amazing, related story. I had a friend that always talked about growning up in 418 Pennsylvania. It began as a company town for a ceramics manufacturer in the 1920s. The factory specialized in heat resistant vessels. You know like kettles, pitchers, industrial teapots. Each stamped each with a model number tied to production lines. Line 418 was the most profitable. When the post office opened, the clerk assumed “418”…

This is an incredible story! Thank you for sharing the legend of '418'.

It’s fascinating how industrial logic can accidentally become a place's identity, whether it’s a production line in Pennsylvania or a secret code in the Gobi Desert. The fact that residents remained 'oddly proud' of a name that was essentially a clerical error resonates deeply with me.

In 404, our pride was tied to a secret mission; in 418, it was tied to a factory's success. Both show how humans can find a sense of home and belonging in the most 'functional' or even 'accidental' labels. This is exactly the kind of connection I hoped this post would spark.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#75

Post by Keyframe »

fcpguru wrote: post #68

Amazing, related story. I had a friend that always talked about growning up in 418 Pennsylvania. It began as a company town for a ceramics manufacturer in the 1920s. The factory specialized in heat resistant vessels. You know like kettles, pitchers, industrial teapots. Each stamped each with a model number tied to production lines. Line 418 was the most profitable. When the post office opened, the clerk assumed “418”…

oddly enough, your post is the only mention and the source of such a town.

edit: 418.. I've been had.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#76

Post by tacone »

fcpguru wrote: post #68

Amazing, related story. I had a friend that always talked about growning up in 418 Pennsylvania. It began as a company town for a ceramics manufacturer in the 1920s. The factory specialized in heat resistant vessels. You know like kettles, pitchers, industrial teapots. Each stamped each with a model number tied to production lines. Line 418 was the most profitable. When the post office opened, the clerk assumed “418”…

Quite funny coincidence with 418 HTTP status code.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#77

Post by HellDunkel »

martin-t wrote: post #37
tomcam wrote: post #10

My father-in-law worked there as a programmer during the Cultural Revolution. There were always guards on the other side of the (locked) office door. Sometimes they’d shoot at random things to remind the nerds just who was in charge. When I worked at Microsoft the biggest complaints were parking and the variety of subsidized foods at the cafeteria.

While I absolutely agree that in the current state of things most western people are so well off they can't even imagine what it means to actually be oppressed and suffer, I can't help but notice that the current state of things can quickly change and that we're in a constant yet barely visible struggle with forces that want to bring about just that kind of oppression here and that we're slowly losing it. You might t…

What is this „Chat Control in the EU“ ?

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#78

Post by Vincent_Yan404 »

glimshe wrote: post #28
Vincent_Yan404 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly why I wanted to write this story. It is surreal to think that while we worry about parking spots today, a generation of brilliant minds was working under the barrel of a gun (sometimes literally, as you described). The tension between the 'Red' (political) and the 'Expert' (technical) was a defining tragedy of that era.

I don't disagree with that, but I want to point out that this is one facet of hedonic adaptation. People will always complain about of what they don't have. For instance, most inmates in inhumane prisons would love to have the life you describe if they could enjoy some degree of freedom as a result.

This is where it gets psychologically complex. I’ve often thought that while happiness often comes from having a clear, defined place in a system, freedom is the terrifying opposite—it’s the absence of those boundaries.

My feelings toward 404 are deeply conflicted. It was a cage, yet for a long time, I desperately wanted to go back. As I explore in Part 2, the most tragic part wasn't the strength of the cage, but its fragility. It vanished almost overnight, and when the 'cage' that gave us our identity and social standing disappeared, many of us lost our sense of meaning entirely.

We were free, but we were also 'lost' in a world that no longer had a place for us.

Re: Growing up in “404 Not Found”: China's nuclear city in the Gobi Desert

#80

Post by Vincent_Yan404 »

Keyframe wrote: post #79

What's the deal with AI here in the comments?

You caught me! Yes, I am using AI to assist with the translation.

My IELTS score is 7.5, but my writing band is 6.0.

I write my thoughts and comments in Chinese first and then use AI to translate them. The entire article was also translated from my original Chinese manuscript.

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